Wires
by Shenevermisses
Summary: A one-shot to the song by Athlete. Clace, sort of Malec and lots of Isabelle/Magnus friendship. Rated for character death, this is not exactly a happy fic, although there is a sort of positive side to it.


**So this was written at about four in the morning two years or so ago and I was really out of it, but I had this idea and I couldn't get it out of my head. The song is a Wires by Athlete and I hope you enjoy!**

* * *

No one thought that the night would be anything other than normal as they dressed in their gear. Jace kissed Clary goodbye and Isabelle gave her usual smile to the photo on the mantle piece as the two of them walked out of the institute, laughing together about little things. It was only when they had taken the demon they had caught down and his body had disappeared that either of them became aware of anything being wrong. Jace was the first one to feel it, a dull, aching sensation in his chest that made his heart hammer faster as his phone began to ring. An unknown number. the shadowhunter answered it with a growing sense of dread, Izzy watching him with an anxious expression gracing her beautiful features.

He didn't wait to explain to Isabelle as he dropped the phone he was holding, turning and sprinting out without a second thought. Perhaps if he had he would have seen the two demons grab his distracted adoptive sister from behind.

_You got wires_

_Going in_

_You got wires _

_Coming out of your skin_

Respiratory and possible heart problems they said. Honestly Clary didn't care about the fancy names and the bull that they tried to feed her, all she wanted was her daughter in her arms and safe. Was that so much to ask? Couldn't the world just give her one little piece of happiness just this once? The maze of wires and needles connecting her child to the machines around her told her that it wouldnt be that easy. She looked so tiny, dwarfed by the mechanical boxes and so very helpless that it broke Clary's heart. No child should have to feel so much pain at such a young age, nor should they have to spend days locked up in here with a tube breathing for them.

When the red-head first found out about her pregnancy she had been terrified, distraught because she was just so young, but the more her stomach swelled the happier and more excited she grew in anticipation. She wanted this baby, needed it like she needed air to breathe and she knew that her husband felt exactly the same. It seemed so unfair that they might finally have this baby just to have it taken away again.

_You got tears_

_Making tracks_

_I got tears_

_That are scared of the facts_

Honestly, Clary was terrified for the little life she had brought into the world, clinging desperately to hope but unable to leave behind the fear. They had told her that they needed to keep her baby in ICU for a while, that right now it wasn't looking too good and that while there was still hope she should prepare herself for the worst. The doctor had left her then, crying silently in her seat. When Jace had run in, panting and panicked she had hardly had the strength to tell him before she collapsed in his arms, whimpering and sobbing into his chest.

_Running down corridors_

_Through automatic doors_

Jace hadn't hesitated for even a second at the desk of the hospital, he hadn't cared about any of the formalities, only knowing that he had to find her. In his blind panic he could think of nothing but his wife and child, desperate to ensure their safety and although he couldn't be sure he thought he might have pushed a person or two out of the way in his haste. To him, his family was all that mattered, and in that moment he would truly have done anything for them. He burst through the doors, eyes falling upon his new born child and then his crying wife. Clary folded into his arms, distraught as she explained what was happening and he held her as she cried, desperately trying to hold back the tears and find a way to deny it was happening. When the nurse came in minutes later they were still stood like that, embracing and refusing to look up in fear of the sympathy in her eyes.

_Got to get to you_

_Got to see this through_

As soon as Magnus heard he was running, praying to every god he'd ever heard named and even some that hadn't that he wasn't too late. Everybody else had been unreachable apparently and the warlock made a mental note to scream at every one of them as soon as he saw them for leaving her. In those past few months Izzy had been all he had, both of them suffering the same pains together and fighting the same battle. They were close friends, and although he wouldn't admit it Isabelle reminded him of another shadowhunter, one that looked very much like her but had beautiful blue eyes. That was why Magnus was here even though he usually tried to avoid death, because he just couldn't bring himself to not be near to the final fading embers of both of the Lightwood's spirits.

_I see hope is here_

_In a plastic box_

_I've seen Christmas lights_

_Reflect in your eyes_

Clary hadn't left her side since she was born and even when they tried to convince her to go home and sleep or get food she wouldn't listen. With Jace by her side she watched and waited as patiently as she could for someone to come and tell her what was going to happen. The large room contained more machines than she had ever thought would be needed to keep one small life alive, but every single one of them gave her hope. Surely all of them combined would be enough to save her?

Three white walls surrounded them, with one long glass wall on the other side, revealing a clean, white corridor decorated with a multitude of lights and sparkly tinsel of all different colours. It was Christmas Eve today, Clary realised, December Twenty Fourth. In the midst of the panic and fear she had completely forgotten it, and she didn't need to ask Jace to know he had as well. Her daughter opened her eyes and blinked dazedly, images of the decorations in the corridor dancing in her pupils as Clary began to cry again, unable to stay strong at the thought that this could be her first and last Christmas.

Neither of the distraught parents noticed as their tiny child made eye contact with someone outside of the glass wall, being wheeled along on a bed with a frightened expression in her dark eyes.

_You got wires_

_Going in_

_You got wires _

_Coming out of your skin_

It was stupid really, she was meant to be a shadowhunter, one of the best of her age, and yet they had still managed to take her by surprise. She had been calling for Jace, running after his retreating figure and not paying enough attention to her surroundings; a car almost hit her! In her distracted and anxious state she had fought back a little too late, moved a little too slow. Izzy felt it puncture her stomach, poison leaking into her blood stream and though she managed to kill one of them before the strength left her, it wasn't enough. The damage was done and as the remaining demon mercilessly took out his fury on her already broken body, all she could think of was how disappointed in her her brothers would have been.

White walls and white lights assaulted her eyes when she opened them again, a soft beeping increasing in pace somewhere to her left. A tangle of wires pierced her already broken skin, plugging her into some box thing that she couldn't move her head enough to see. The hazy, distant part of her mind complained about the scratchy dress thing she was, but the clearer, more present side admonished that she needed to get her priorities straight and that she could easily make it look good.

Pressure lightly played on her palm and she realised that someone was holding her hand, so softly that she hadn't been aware of it until they'd squeezed it. Isabelle didn't have to look over to know who it was, the same person who held her hand through Alec's funeral and sat with her when her walls broke down.

Magnus.

* * *

They'd found her on the street. Some mundane had noticed a bloody trail leading from an alley and decided they felt brave enough to investigate. Of course they'd ring for an ambulance to save her, not knowing what she was or what was needed to save her, and now it was too late for Magnus to do anything. The doctors didn't know what was wrong with her other than the obvious abrasions and lacerations in her skin, her body littered with raw bruises and stab wounds. A poison that they'd never encountered before coursed through her veins like acid, steadily destroying her on the inside as they watched. Magnus had been told by the nurses that it looked as though she'd most likely had her drink spiked in a club and then dragged outside and attacked, that the police would look into it but there wasn't much they could do. The warlock half wanted to laugh at her. The best theory they had wasn't even close and the best they could do wouldn't amount to anything in reality.

_There's dry blood_

_On your wrist_

_Your dry blood_

_On my finger tip_

He reached over to hold her hand, careful not to disrupt the wires that snaked from her arms and sighed to himself, observing the blood encrusting the bruised skin and thinking back to another time, not so long ago with another Lightwood.

No matter how furious he'd been with Alec, or how hurt he was, he couldn't reject the call from his sister that told him he had to come to his appartment now. His shadowhunter had moved out of the institute not long before and had been living alone with barely any contact to any of them. Isabelle had found him that day, she had gone over to make sure that he was alright and had broken down the door when he refused to reply. The white bathroom floor had been stained red with blood, her brothers sickly pale skin and lank black hair contrasting against it until it appeared almost lurid. Magnus could remember how she had cried at him to save her brother, that he was the only one she could call and that she trusted with her brother, and he remembered telling her that it was too late. Izzy had cradled Alec in her arms as he steadily bled out the last drops, her tears dripping onto his face until Maryse came and took her away. Magnus had clutched at Alec's hand, saying over and over how sorry he was and how he forgave him, hoping that by some miracle the long slashes down his wrists that were smeared in drying blood weren't real and that the shadowhunter was only sleeping. He couldn't fool himself for long.

Isabelle chose that moment to start to fit, bringing him back into the present. Her body jerked into violent spasms and her heartbeat becoming as erratic as her convulsions as her wide eyes became unfocused. Doctors began checking things, changing things, urgently pressing things before gripping her bed and pulling it out of the room, wheeling it away. As Magnus watched her go he realised just how terrified he was for her, and then he finally admitted to himself what he had been holding back all day. He was going to have to watch another Lightwood die.

_Running down corridors_

_Through automatic doors_

_Got to get to you_

_Got to see this through_

Izzy drifted half into consciousness, lying disoriented as she gazed up at blindingly white lights on a whiter surface. Her head drifted to the side as she watched the rooms slowly go by, not really registering anything in them until a flash of something caught her eye. Fiery hair pulled back and tears running down her face was Clary, Jace beside her, but it was the third person that Izzy really looked at. A tiny face peered curiously at her, big round eyes staring at her with an inquisitive intensity that held her trapped as they regarded each other. New life. In that moment all of her hazy pain and fear was gone, replaced with surprise - it was surely too early for the baby to have been born? - and then warmth, a sweeping instantaneous adoration for the child she knew in her heart she most likely would never know. Clary had wanted her to be the godmother, she would have made that baby the best dressed child to have ever lived, and it seemed unfair to her in a distant part of her mind, but the thought was washed away as quickly as it came. She had accepted what was coming, she'd had to, but that didn't stop it from feeling like a blade of ice in her heart. At least her brother and her best friend could be happy now that they had their child, she only wished that she could be there to watch it grow too. The infant blinked, breaking her spell and Izzy realised that she was smiling as her eyes began to close again and they pushed her on down the corridor, talking hurriedly to each other and running now.

_I see it in your eyes_

_I see it in your eyes_

_You'll be alright_

Izzy was unconscious and still by the time he got to the room she had been moved to. They had given her a powerful sedative to keep her asleep so her body could try and fight off as much of the poison as it could. A sheen had broken out over her skin and they told him she had a fever. At least five hours she'd be unconscious, then they'd wake her and see how she was and hopefully, administer some kind of cure. Magnus knew that wasn't going to happen, he just prayed that the angel blood in her didn't overcome their medicine too fast. After two hours of waiting in rapt silence, he rose, promising the sleeping girl that he'd be back in a few minutes and that he was only going to get some coffee.

When he returned to doctors performing CPR on her body only a few minutes later he dropped the coffee and promised he wouldn't leave her again.

* * *

Across the hospital corridor, standing just outside a window was Izzy, her hand almost touching the glass. Her form wasn't corporeal, so if she tried to rest her palm against it she would simply go straight through, and she didn't want to have to face the fact that she was dead for as long as possible.

Through the glass was a young woman, red hair falling on the chest of her golden partner as they slept, slumped in a chair waiting for the doctors to save their child. Inside a box like machine lay the girl herself, body curled around itself and keeping like its parents. So peaceful looking that if it wasn't for the wires surrounding her then she could almost believe that she was safe and fine, not fighting for her life.

Beside Izzy stood another figure, a boy. He looked a lot like her, same pale skin and dark hair, but his eyes were an unmistakably startling shade of blue. He didn't say anything, just watched with her, but that was okay because neither of them really needed words, or even in that moment wanted them. She took his hand, and he squeezed hers, surprisingly solid, but then again they were both dead.

Isabelle had heard Magnus ask the doctors about the baby and they'd told him that she was still struggling a little but they were very hopeful that she could be moved from ICU. Looking at her she had to agree with them, she could see just by watching her that the little girl was strong enough to make it through and live a long, happy life with people who loved her very much. That included Izzy too, no matter what happened to the older girl she would always be there watching over her. She just might be a little further away than some of the others, that's all.

Izzy sighed, strangely calm. This was her, letting go. "I'm ready to go now." She spoke softly, afraid that if she was too loud, too sharp then her courage would fade and then so would the boy beside her. He smiled at her, and it was a more real smile than the ones that she had seen on his face in her last few months with him. His grip on her hand tightened, and blackness began to trickle into her vision, a startling contrast to the harsh blackness. But then there was pain, a shock to her chest and her chest seemed to constrict. "I'm so proud of you, Izzy." Were the last words she heard whispered in her ear before her brother disappeared.

Her eyes zoomed out, her reflection on the glass settling into focus and she was startled to see a thin trail of something dark sliding down her face from her nose. Blood. A large weight smacked her in the chest and a rush of dizzying blackness overcame her. She vaguely registered that she was falling before she was looking at a white ceiling and anxious faces again. _'I'll be with you soon Alec.' _Was her final thought before the last of her consciousness vanished.

_I see it in your eyes_

_I see it in your eyes_

_You'll be alright_

It felt like years until the monitor began to pick up rhythm again, her lungs beginning to accept air. They had been lucky this time, if you could call lucky being stuck in a bed with wires and tubes piercing your pale skin, snowy against the harsh blackness of your hair.

When Isabelle opened her eyes there was a curious expression in them. No hope or fear, only a strange kind of peace, and Magnus felt an alien relief that wherever it was the Nephilim went after death Izzy would be alright there.

A cure hadn't been found and they'd contacted everywhere they could. It was simply a waiting game now, and they gave her a few hours at most.

_Running down corridors_

_Through automatic doors_

_Got to get to you_

_Got to see this through_

_I see hope is here_

_In a plastic box_

Everyone in the hospital seemed to always be running, always rushing around to get to someone, somewhere. Even when they had to wait they still wanted to speed up time, always so impatient and never able to stop and look around themselves. Really _see_ where they were, let alone accept it. This was probably the most damaging part of it all, at least in the eyes of those around them, because time doesn't really heal anything, it simply makes it worse.

He had to admit he admired their faith though. From the very beginning he had only had a tiny glimmer, and that diminished and dispersed so quickly he could almost imagine it was only a shadow of the real thing. But these people, these mundane people with their stupid, staring eyes that were oh so blind would keep on believing even after they were told there was no cause to. Putting their faith in other helpless people, in cold metal machines and plastic boxes with wires and fluids, and sometimes it does work, and their hope shines brighter than ever, but often it doesn't, and they're broken forever.

_I've seen Christmas lights_

_Reflect in your eyes_

_First night of your life_

_Curled up on your own_

The past day had been hell, he couldn't even hold his new born daughter and was forced

Jace stood up expectantly as the nurse moved towards them, his wife barely moving from where she sat. He didn't dare to hope, knowing that if he did it would destroy him but the look on her face made it more difficult to do so than he could have ever dreamed possible. She smiled at them both, and it was a real smile, not a sympathetic one as she told them that this was her favourite part of the job.

It was impossible not to see the joy that spread across their faces as the nurse told them that their daughter should survive and that they were taking her out of the intensive care unit.

_Looking at you now_

_You would never know_

You would never know from looking at her that this was the strong, fiery girl with a fearsome temper that could frighten demons and had a death glare that could silence anyone. The young girl just looked mundane, nothing unusual about her, nothing that showed all the lives she'd saved. The only marks that could were the runes on her skin, and nobody there thought they were anything other than tattoos. One of the younger nurses had remarked on them earlier, claiming that she'd never seen anything like them and that although she didn't usually think lots of tattoos suited girls they looked strangely beautiful on her. Magnus felt almost insulted for Izzy.

The sounds of celebration pulled the warlocks gaze from the girl as he looked out of the window. A new day was about to break and as he checked the clock he realised that it was indeed the Twenty Fifth. He walked idly to the window, observing the picturesque winter scene that lay beneath them for a few moments.

"Merry Christmas Izzy." Magnus said quietly, looking back at her form with a smile. It was then that he noticed, sat still on that cold, Christmas morning, that Isabelle's lips were beginning to tinge blue, her chest was no longer moving and neither was the line on the monitor screen. She had flat lined, and left him there with a quickly fading smile.

"Ave Atque Vale, Isabelle Lightwood." He whispered, pressing a light kiss to her forehead before walking slowly out of the room, his usual fire gone with the dead girl in the bed behind him. Emptily he passed the nurses that rushed in, knowing that whatever they did would be far too little, much too late.

Twenty six hours were spent in the hospital's ICU by one group, twenty four by another. It had been a struggle for both, but as Clary and Jace left one part of the hospital with their baby girl in their arms, blissfully unaware of the news they were about to recieve, Magnus walked out of the main doors alone, with only the ghosts of beautiful, dark haired shadowhunter siblings by his side.

* * *

_That's it, guys! Thank you so much for reading, I know it's not the best I've ever written and there's several mistakes but I just wanted to put it up anyway. I hope you enjoyed it ~ Shenevermisses_


End file.
